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Free Expression, Privacy & Data

The ‘Just in Case You’re a Criminal Someday’ Act

Imagine a world in which your Internet service provider stores information that would make it trivial for every website you visit, every blog you read and each purchase you make online to be made available to the cops … just in case you commit a crime someday. This is no casual reference to the “Big Brother is Watching You” dystopian world of George Orwell’s “1984;” it is the reality of H.R. 1981, a bill in Congress that orders Internet companies to build vast digital warehouses that record and store information that links your online activities to your name and address.